Lawful Terrorism Playing devil's advocate BY MARY O'BRIEN A devil's advocate, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is "a person appointed by the Roman Catholic Church to challenge a proposed beatification or canonization, or the verification of a miracle." A functioning democracy is dependent on elected as well as self-appointed devil's advocates. Functioning citizens also play devil's advocate to their own concepts and mantras. One canonized word deserving devil's advocacy is "terrorism." The U.S. Department of Defense defines terrorism as "the unlawful use of — or threatened use of — force or violence against individuals or property to coerce or intimidate governments or societies, often to achieve political, religious, or ideological objectives." Apparently the U.S. Department of Defense figures the lawful "use of — or threatened use of — force or violence against individuals or property to coerce or intimidate governments or societies, often to achieve political, religious, or ideological objectives" is not terrorism. So, who gets to pass laws that transform terrorism into lawful acts? If the democratically elected Palestinian government passes a law advocating violence against individuals to intimidate other governments or societies in order to achieve political or ideological objectives, then it's "lawful" and not terrorism, right? Or is it only our laws that transform terrorism into law-abiding behavior? Does waging war against Iraqis based on unsupportable claims about the existence of "mass weapons of destruction" in Iraq by the country with the largest arsenal of mass weapons of destruction in the history of the world constitute terrorism or "lawful" violence? Was the U.S. CIA overthrow of democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh of Iran in 1953 lawful or terrorism? Does capturing people and sending them to secret prisons in unnamed countries to be tortured without those people having recourse to any legal defense or review by the International Red Cross constitute terrorism or "lawful" violence? Which brings us more broadly to the word "lawful." The front page of a recent Register-Guard carried a lead story, "Millions in Katrina aid wasted." Thankfully, the Hurricane Katrina Fraud Task Force is looking into various forms of such clearly unlawful activity as people using a duplicate or false Social Security to obtain a $2,000 debit card. On the same day, back on page seven in the same newspaper, an article was entitled "Oil firms to get $7 billion windfall." It explained that oil companies will get "royalties relief" in the form of taking $65 billion worth of oil and natural gas from national public lands over the next five years without paying any royalties to the nation. As this free-ride mining and destruction of public lands is based on laws and regulations passed in 1996, it is clearly lawful.   One particularly astute initiative of the Bush administration is to make lawsuits unlawful via regulations. For instance, automakers are currently being sued for some of the 596 deaths a year caused by roof failures during roll-overs. In response, the U.S. Transportation Department is proposing to require minor increases in roof strength. The new regulation, already met by 70 percent of vehicles, costs automakers only $12 per car, and is expected to result in only 13-44 fewer roof-failure deaths a year. But another part of the regulation states that no roof failure lawsuits will be able to be brought against automakers that adhere to this "new" regulation. Similarly, the administration is making environmental laws unlawful via "preemption." For instance, the Southern California Air Quality Board recently passed a regulation that would have required local governments and school districts to purchase cleaner-running buses and garbage trucks. The Bush administration joined the Western States Petroleum Association and Engine Manufacturers Association in a Supreme Court challenge to the regulation. Over-ruling federal District and Appeals courts that had judged this health- and environment-protective regulation lawful, our Supreme Court proclaimed the regulation unlawful. Lawful greed, public endangerment, environmental destruction, and pollution are still greed, public endangerment, environmental destruction and pollution. And "lawful" unilateral invasions and terrorism are still unilateral invasions and terrorism. Laws that serve the powerful instead of the vulnerable; our nation above the world; or our species at the expense of all our relations are not the laws of a great country. Mary O'Brien of Eugene has worked as a public interest scientist since 1981. The issues she raises in this column will be discussed at length at the Public Interest Environmental Law Conference coming up this weekend at UO. O'Brien will speak at a NEPA panel at 4 pm, Friday and will introduce the Friday lunch keynote speaker, Dinah Bear.
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